


Dude, what's wrong?

by orphan_account



Category: South Park
Genre: Aged Up, Alternate Universe - High School, Eating Disorders, Implied/Referenced Self-Harm, Kyle Is Sweet, M/M, Multi, References to Depression, Self-Esteem Issues, This is the Big Sad, eric is fucking depressed, kyle is the only one who notices
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2019-11-25
Updated: 2019-11-25
Packaged: 2021-02-25 22:20:11
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,098
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21562867
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/orphan_account/pseuds/orphan_account
Summary: Eric's transition into teen years really changed him, but he has always been so good with keeping up the loud persona that he built up over the years. Of course, Kyle really saw through his smiles not reaching his eyes before or how Eric's attention span has changed.Trigger warning!!Implied Eating DisordersImplied SuicideSelf-Harm
Relationships: Kyle Broflovski/Eric Cartman
Comments: 6
Kudos: 58





	Dude, what's wrong?

Eric stared into the mirror poking and prodding his face. Running his fingers in the hairs that had been growing on his chin for a good few months now. The guys had made fun of him, jabbing him with jokes of being a neckbeard. He, of course, over reacted to it with his usual bickering. But he wasn't planning on shaving it off, that required too much energy. Not only that but he finds comfort of the thought of a beard coming through, maybe finally his double chin won't be as evident as he's insecure it is.

"Bleh" Eric retorted to himself. He grabbed the can of dry shampoo his mother kept on the side of the sink dousing his greasy hair with it. He massaged it into his hair, already heavy and chalky with the product he'd used for the past several days. Eric just really couldn't bring himself to wash his hair, too much energy. Staring at the wall or mindlessly playing video games seemed like much a better choice.

Almost like every day as of late, the thought of leaving the house and going to school made Eric feel butterflies in his stomach, but they felt particularly heavy today, like they were made of solid steel. He shrugged off the thoughts deeming that a full day of discomfort was easier than a barrage of "are you okay?" messages from his friends feigning interest. But only then, those messages are more to try and see if there's any gossip for them to not miss out on. Usually when he gets those messages his immediate response is just "yeah, just sick", no one ever seems to pry after that.

"Bye ma" he shouts, slamming the door behind him. Eric loved his mother, of course. But the years of being spoilt, although at the time made him feel on top of the world and happy, but the overfeeding and endless treats are the root of his depression and anxiety. He figures a lot would be better if it weren't for his big body.

Growing up naturally Eric found things he was interested in, fashion became a more prevalent interest. His escapades of cross dressing in his youth truly made him appreciate colour, art and fashion. But due to being overweight he could never wear the clothes that made him happy. He has, on several occasions, invested in and tried attire that he adores for him to stand in front of the mirror, disappointed and disgusted. Leading him to just resort to comfortable clothes, stretchy jeans and oversized t-shirts. He'd always tuck the baggy tops in and pull it out to emphasise the bagginess and hopefully create the illusion he isn't as large as he is.

The cold climate of South Park always gave him some comfort, he’d read somewhere online that being cold made you lose more weight. He never bothered to fact check that but the thought of him being able to shift a little bit of weight made him slightly happier. So, he never particularly wore coats anymore. Usually Eric would just wear oversized shirts as jackets. Of course, his friends frequently questioned his temperature just to have him shrug it off, despite being fucking freezing.

Eric neared Kyle’s house. They didn’t really take the bus anymore as the guys all had their licenses, well, all apart from Kenny. Being so close to each other Kyle and Cartman would often take turns in giving each other a ride. Stan usually drove Kenny, but he’d also take Wendy and Bebe, who would pitch in a little for gas.

Standing outside Eric shot a quick “here” text. No one particularly knocks anymore. Eric especially didn’t want to knock on the Broflovski door, he absolutely did not want to risk his parents answering. To receive either, a horrible glare and completely unwarranted remarks from his mother, or an incredibly awkward small talk conversation with his father. No thanks.

It was only a few moments later for Kyle to leave the house. “Sup’ fatass” he remarked, wandering over to his car. Despite being incredibly self-conscious about his weight the remark never particularly affected him. Eric understood it was said with no malice and often did actually find the humour in it. Today wasn’t of those days, he’d be lying if it didn’t sting a little.

Cartman climbed into the car carefully, insecure on how his weight would rock the car if he just plopped himself in. He strapped the seatbelt on himself and bunched up his shoulders, the seats in the car were particularly freezing and it took everything for Eric not to yelp.

Kyle breathed put his cars heater on full whack. He took his gloves off and breathes hot air into his hands, rubbing them together with vigour “fucking cooooold” he complained, his jaw clattering slightly.

“Heh” Eric sighed “It’s not that cold pussy”.

Kyle just rolled his eyes, changing the topic. “Yo, did you do the homework last night?”

Dread filled Eric, the butterflies of anxiety which hadn’t soon passed were now back. “Fuuuuck dude.” He hadn’t.

He spent the whole night with Stan playing some random survival game. The mind-numbing resource grinding had been especially helpful for him to disassociate from the thought of going back to school the day after. “psch, ah well” he shrugged off, a pathetic attempt to convince himself it’s alright. It wasn’t, but instead of stressing about it, he was thinking up some bullshit excuse the teacher would totally see through.

Most of the car ride was the pair enthusing about the weekend. Eric took the car rides as an opportunity to put his mask on and be the goofy person his peers knew him as.

Eric’s morning went as usual. Bullshitting to the teacher about his lack of homework, which she completely saw through, but was too exhausted and underpaid to argue with him. Majority was spent swinging back on his chair and staring out of the window, into the distance.

Lunch came around, one of the most stressful parts of his day. With struggling with self-esteem issues regarding his weight, overwhelming anxiety with food comes soon after. He usually forces himself to eat at school because on the times where he does skip a meal he is met with question after question and because his day has already started off especially shit he decided he had to eat. He tried to get something that seemed healthy and low calorie, but not too low calorie or again, he would be met with a multitude of intruding questions. He just settled with pasta in the end, accompanied with a bottle of chocolate milk, which he knew he’d not be able to drink the entire thing.

The conversation topics were just the usual, gross guy talk in which Cartman would fight to be the loudest person at the table. It was a pleasant distraction to the fact he was eating.

Kyle sat quietly watching cartman, though talking animatedly and loudly, with plenty of smiles, something seemed off.

The others were too preoccupied in the conversation they were having, too notice Kyle. Which he believed to be about women. An ironic subject considering a good few at the table, well rather those who were the loudest, he suspects have absolutely no interest in women. Overcompensation he figured.

For some time now Kyle had noticed Eric had been portraying some sort of façade. It’s becoming all too common for him to catch Eric’s smile not reach his eyes, to have him hunched over in a bid to hide himself away and especially for Cartman to tug on his clothing so it didn’t cling to his body. Some part of Kyle was insisting he shouldn’t care because Eric’s been nothing but a dick for a large portion of their friendship. But he just couldn’t.

Since starting high school Kyle has seen this whole new part of Eric. Yes, he was still brash, bold and overly loud. But there seemed a certain softness to him. They’d become significantly closer since they had their car rides together. There were some days where they’d just drive somewhere and hang out. Do stupid shit like play on park equipment or piss off the general public. The guys would often tease the two as boyfriends. Of course, it was met by louds shouting on both parts but secretly Kyle would think _would that really be a bad thing?_

But today especially the Ginger lad noticed Eric was having a hard day. He seemed louder than normal, like he was trying too hard to appear okay. He would certainly drive them to one of their hang-out spots and try and talk to him.

\-----

“Erm, Kyle? Where are taking us?” Eric quizzed, noticing Kyle was driving in a completely different direction of their street.

“Just figured it’d be a nice evening to look over the town.”

Eric agreed, it had been an especially clear day, which would mean the sunset would be beautiful.

As it was Autumn the sun was close to setting but it would be long before they were at their viewing spot. It was a popular place to view over the town, but it was so bitterly cold today Eric supposed there wouldn’t be many people there. Which was a comforting thought.

Just as expected the small parking lot that overlooked the town was absolutely empty. The pair got out of the car and started rifling through Kyle’s car boot. Everything was arranged neatly, a few thick blankets were perfectly folded amongst his repair kit, extra bolts and such. Cartman grabbed those as Kyle picked up a few cans of soda out of the case he had in there.

The guys all laughed when they found out that Kyle stores pop in his car but the drinks had helped them all out in times of thirst.

Eric set one blanket down on the hood of Kyle’s car, gently lowering himself down, nervous to damage the metal plating. But no mind, Kyle had a hearty reliable car and it made no movement. He draped the other blanket over himself.

Kyle placed the two cans next to Eric before, not so elegantly throwing himself to sit beside the larger boy. “Were you planning on staring that blanket?” he asked.

“No, screw you, Jew!” Eric snickered. Despite the sentiment he scooted closer to Kyle, who took the corner of the blanket and placed it over his shoulders. The pair peered off into the setting sun momentarily. It wouldn’t be fully set for a good 30 minutes yet.

“Cartman, sorry to get all gay on you, but… are you okay?” Kyle said,

Without a beat Eric nodded his head, “yeah, I’m good Kyle! Are you okay?” he was kicking himself at how unconvincing that sounded. But honestly Eric was so exhausted from an especially hard day of pretending he is okay.

“Come on Cartman. I know you’re not okay!” He frowned at Eric, opening his can firmly.

Eric stared at the dying light of the sun, his brows uncharacteristically soft. “I don’t know what’s wrong with me…” He seemed as if he was going to carry on, but it was as if the words had died in his throat. Instead he just repeated “I don’t know”.

To try and distract himself form the clearly uncomfortable topic Eric picked up his can and focused on opening it. He was glad that the soda Kyle had was diet. With the topic Kyle had proposed the last thing Eric needed was stress and anxiety from drinking his calories. He took a sizable gulp in an attempt to soothe the vicious growling from his stomach, caused by a mixture of hunger and the aggressive boughs of anxiety he’d experienced today. After setting his can down he fished in his top shirt pocket for his pack of cigarettes. He slid one into his mouth, grimacing about how poorly he rolled one. He gestured the packet to Kyle, who surprisingly took one. Kyle usually doesn’t like to smoke, not because he is against it, more so because he couldn’t be bothered with his mothers lecturing when he comes home smelling like the _‘death sticks’_ , she referrers to them. Eric let Kyle light his first. In which he took a deep drag and spluttered, causing Cartman to laugh around the cigarette he gripped in the centre of his mouth. He then lit his own and put the lighter back in the pack where it nestled against the cigarettes.

“I know it’s hard…” Kyle started as Eric took a longer drag than he had. “But please just talk to me Cartman.”

Eric tensed his jaw, he briefly thought about just cracking a joke. But he could tell that wouldn’t work. He was backed up against the wall and the butterflies in his stomach started creeping back, his blood running cold with the anxiety of the situation. He glanced at Kyle to see emerald green eyes burning a hole into him, his thick eyebrows furrowed, clearly frustrated about Cartman’s lack of venting.

Closing his eyes Eric slowly released the drag he had taken. “Fine.”

“I don’t know what’s wrong. It just seems like growing up has really fucked me over. I miss being the blissful fat child who only thought about himself. I miss not having a care in the world. I miss not feeling shit about my body every single fucking day.” He spat the last part out, frustrated at himself.

Kyle just wordlessly listened. He had suspected just as much from Cartman but somehow it really hurt to hear him say that. _Why am I hurting so much for Cartman?_ Kyle questioned himself.

Both looked off back to the setting sun, which now started to bathe the surroundings in a warm golden hue.

“I don’t want to label myself as depressed. But I fucking am Kyle! I’m incredibly depressed. The only reason I still get up and go is because the thought of having people ask me if I’m okay is unbearable. It seems like most people only really ask so… I don’t know… so- so if I _do_ ki- do something regrettable, then they’d not have a guilty conscience.”

Both of the boys felt sick. Cartman at the thought of telling someone all this. Kyle at the thought of one of his best friends are dealing with suicidal ideation, that he is struggling _this_ much. But both agreed with the message of Eric’s feelings.

Kyle stayed quiet, listening to Eric, but turning to face him. Eric looked back at him, continuing his distress. “I just feel so lonely. Every day I’m around so many people yet I’m so fucking lonely. I feel no one _truly_ know me.”

“I know you!!” Kyle insisted.

Eric scoffed, “you don’t know the half of it.” He flicked the dying cigarette onto the group, Kyle followed suit.

“Then tell me then! I just want to help you!” Kyle shouted, frustrated.

Cartman was taken aback by the reaction. He took a moment to ponder. No one had particularly taken the time to talk to him like this and it really threw him off. He never really expected it from someone like Kyle. But he supposes in the past year they’re grown closer and closer.

He studied Kyle’s face. The golden light bathed his cheeks, making his sea of freckles pop. Eric noted how Kyle had exceptionally long eyelashes, frozen in place by his unwavering gaze. The golden light was glinting in Kyle’s amazingly green eyes.

Eric couldn’t help himself.

He grabbed Kyle’s cheek with one hand, his shoulder with the other and pulled him in for a kiss.

In shock, Kyle flinched, knocking over one of the drinks, which spilled all over Eric’s lap, causing him to recoil and jump off the car’s bonnet. “Ah shit!” he screamed, trying to brush the liquid off his jeans before it soaked in. But mid action he stopped dead his eyes, full of panic shot up to Kyle. Who sat there, eyes wide, lips slightly parted, a huge blush spreading across his face.

Fearing the worst Eric threw his hands behind his head, pacing frantically chanting _oh shit, oh shit, oh shit_ in his head.

In his panic he didn’t notice Kyle had gotten up from the car and walked towards him. He only realised when his arm was grabbed, sending searing pain shooting up his arm. Eric yelped, ripping his arm away from Kyle, doubling over with pain.

“Woah dude are you okay?” Kyle asked, completely confused.

“Mm, yeah I’m fine” Eric tried to compose himself, standing up straight.

Kyle grabbed his hand, firmly, pulling his arm up. He carefully slid Cartman’s sleeve up to show a whole array of angry red lines stretched across his arm, a few had begun to bleed from Kyle grabbing them. Eric couldn’t bring himself to look and Kyle pulled a handkerchief out of his pocket. His mother insisted he carry it. He pressed it on Eric’s open wounds eliciting a hiss from him. Tears had begun to sting Kyle’s eyes, he was incredibly overwhelmed trying to process what had happened in such a short period.

Cartman kissed him. Cartman… Eric Cartman… kissed _him_.

It wasn’t _bad_ , strangely Kyle enjoyed it. Why?

Kyle stared intensely at the handkerchief he had pressed onto Eric’s arm. He tried to blink away the tears building up but that only made them run down his cheeks. He was glad Eric was avoiding looking at him right now. But that was short lived as Kyle involuntarily sniffled, snapping the shorter male’s attention to him.

“Why?” Kyle asked, attempting to distract Cartman from the tears running down his cheeks. But also for _needed_ answers.

“I’m sorry” he whispered, very uncharacteristically.

Kyle left the handkerchief on Cartman’s arm, going back over to his car, packing up the blankets. He knocked the other can onto the floor. He knew it was bad for him to do but right now littering was the last of his issues. In the time he’d put his things in the boot Eric had sat in the car and was failing to put his seatbelt on one handed. Which Kyle reached over and did for him, resulting in a deep red blush filling Eric’s cheeks.

The drive to Eric’s house was wordless, the pair focussing on the road in front of them. As they pulled into Eric’s drive both undid their seatbelts and went inside, Kyle locking his car. This made Eric’s gut feel heavy. There’s no way he can get out of this now.

**Author's Note:**

> This will be carried onto a part 2. If there's enough of a response I may continue as a series of one-shots ranging from light hearted to heavy subjects.


End file.
